Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1887-11-02
All Hail, Virginia.


Notwithstanding some of her sons are
trying to lead her astray on the tariff issue,
here's to Old Virginia from the bottom
of our hearts. There is one producing
interest in which not even her weakest
kneed citizen ever dreamed that there
was the slightest need of protection from
any nation of the earth, and that was the
noblest branch of production of them
all-the production of great men. In
producing and breeding good men and
women-generals, statesmen, judges,
makers of histories, constructors of in
stitutions of liberty and systems of gov
ernment-no true Virginian ever feared
for a moment that any people could ever
compete with her on basis of perfectly
free trade.
So, when following this glorious and
true bent of her genius she has held her
own against the world, and has produced
the greater per capita of superior work.
manship in that line and Of historical
wealth, time and the number of pro-
ducers being considered, than any other
people since the golden age of Rome.
First. They began the other day at
Richmond, Va, to work on n pedes-
tai which is to bear forever the statue
of Robert E. Lee. Virginia is poor
in money, but she has her Jewels
from richer fields than those OF the
Roman-so rich that all the money
of the world cannot buy. Just think of
it One little State consecrates her lit
tie capital with statues of two such
sons of hers as George Wash
lngton and Robert f. Lee. In the
only two great wars of the nation
it was Virginia which furnished the most
illustrious figures in each-whole, large,
colossal and of immaculate moral white
ness. while overtowering everything else
in their generations. But even this is but
a part of the treasures in that open air gal
lery of heroes at the Falls Of the James.
Around the equestrian statue of Wash
ington stand the efligies of men, also the
sons of Virginia, who taught our fore
fathers to break the British yoke, who
wrote orr original Magma Charta, the
Virginia Bill of Rights, who wrote the De-
claration of independence, who drew up
the Constitution of the United States,
who bore a most conspicuous part in
guiding with master hand the destines
of the nation in the first quarter century
of independence, when the dangers and
difficulties of the tentative stages of
diplomacy, legislation, and government
we're even greater than were the perils
Of war In that group of immortals
stand such sons of Virginia as Mason,
Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, and Henry.
And at little distance is the marble
figure of still another Virginian-a
figure which no Kentuckian could see in
distant State without a throb of the
heart-the statue of Henry Clay.
God bless the Old Dominion Let us
all rise up once more, as we hear this
pious tribute OF her good people to Vir-
ginia's last contribution to the Pantheon
of human greatness-let us all rise up
and call her blessed forever more
This last man is son of Virginia, to
whom Abraham Lincoln, with the coun-
sci of Winfield Scott, another Virginian,
made formal tender of the chief COM
mand of the armies of the United States |
Robert L. Lee, then colonel of
cavalry, who had spent his military
life in that splendid service, was
known to feel an intense devotion /
to the Union, and here he had /
the opportunity, while but hardly be-
yond the flower OF life, aud yet in its
richest fruitage, of stepping at once
above the heads of all his brother off !
GERS to the pinnacle of military eminence.
But nc paused and waited-not for adj
vice or any process of reasoning, for all
that was already Professionally settled
he waited only for an act-an act Of the
Virginia Convention for or against Sc
cession. 1t came for secession, and Lee,
his commission and declining
the higher honor held out TO him, de.
voted his career, his life, his all TO his ma
tive State. He did this without any
pledges or agreements, and for very
period he served his State
in comparatively obscure positions.
On this occasion oil patriotic and true
men in every State will sympathize with
Virginia. The sentimental part of hui
nan nature can be despised only by mer-
'enary and callous wretches whose souls,
I they have any, are in the clods. The
,anse for which Lee fought is dead, and
he issue he sought to help in settling
5 settled forever. His noble indi'vidu-
lily and his life consecrated to heroic
luty will hereafter be blent harmoni-
usly with those Of the great characters
whose historic figures stand in metal and